Published: April 30, 2009 11:27 pm      

Meeks AME Chapel honors servant leaders

Banquet brings churches, civic leaders together

Tears trickled down the face of the 99-year-old Christine Meeks; tears filled the eyes of her son who left Royse City at age 17, as he recounted seeing his mother pray over a pile of lumber 20 years ago.

The moment culminated a formal banquet night of music and appreciation: the growing Meeks AME Chapel named 12 area citizens and businesses as Community Servant Leaders.

The awards themselves honor, by their very names, past and present citizens, including the late Earnest Epps and the late Meagan Davis who would have graduated this year.

Not only was Sister Christine Meeks named “Lifetime Community Servant”, her name is on on another award..

“The awards were carefully chosen to express the contributions of those individuals in Royse City’s history who have been true community servant leaders,” said the Rev. Marshall Hobbs, assigned to Meeks Chapel in November.

Bob Ray Sanders, columnist for the Fort Worth Star Telegram, known for decades for his taking on tough subjects in civic and journalism work, emceed, and asked for “amens” after particularly powerful addresses and singing, and the crowd responded, as it also did with “that’s right” for many of the stories recounted.

The audience contained many members and friends of Meeks Chapel and of First United Methodist Church, as well as area citizens, some of recent arrival, others of several generations.

They listened to two sons deliver testimony as to the strengths of their mothers, each of whom received an award.

Christine Meeks award was given to her by her son, Bennie Meeks, who also thanked the community for helping his niece.

Geneva Hannon, daughter of Christine Meeks, received the Earnest Epps Award from the hands of her son, Jerry Hannon.

“In time God does everything right,” Meeks said. “This city has for seven generations that I know of known this woman, and I’m proudest of her labor,” he said, about which she never complained, he said. “Why are you doing this?” he would ask her of her effort to keep Meeks Chapel going even upon its literal collapse about 20 years ago.

“She went to that pile of rubble and started picking out the lumber and she did that and stacked them up on the site and she prayed over them and poured out her heart on the ground,” he said. “I watched her as she did that and I prayed that God would make it all right. She, her brother and niece Bonnie were the only members.”

Of Bonnie he also spoke. “That young woman,” he said motioning to Bonnie Hannon, who helped organize the ceremony, “had a malady in her hearing — for 35 years — when it was discovered her learning capacity was gone.”

“She was taught by my mother and nurtured by the people of this town and they gave her the opportunity and spirit to become a functional member of this town,” he said. “I want you to understand that anything is possible with God.”

Hannon spoke of his own mother, one of Christine Meek’s nine children, Geneva Hannon, also known as Mama Gigi. “All of us were really poor, sometimes we had to go to be with extra people inside the house. She made sacrifices for people she didn’t even know,” he said. “She has intestinal fortitude and unconditional love. God has really touched this woman’s soul,” he said, noting she got her high school diploma late in life. Hannon said after the program she was 65 when she got it.

In her thanks, Geneva Hannon quoted from her favorite poem: “Let us be up and doing, with a heart for anything. Still achieving, still pursuing. Learn to labor and to wait.”

Two young Royse City High School graduates come May received the Meagan Davis Award: Edwin Ty Johnson and Janis Mapps.

“Never once with these two young people have I ever heard them complain. I asked them to do something and they did it,” Rev. Hobbs said.

Johnson said he is inspired by his grandparents, Velma Johnson and Inez Johnson, and his mother Revonda Johnson. He noted peer pressure can make it difficult to be a servant leader, and said it wouldn’t be possible without God.

Mapps said gave her thank you on behalf of the senior class, with many of whom she had joined earlier in the day in the Meagan Davis Walk From the Heart.

Royse City ISD employees were two two award recipients, math teacher Sheila Irby and alternative school principal, former assistant superintendent, Dr. Ben Setliff.

“For a person that talks all the time, I’m a little nervous,” said Irby, who has taught for 29 years. “ “I feel kind of guilty for accepting the award,” she said. “I love to teach, I love students. It is just normal to be a servant to students and to the community,” she said.

“I don’t teach the kids, my teachers do,” said Dr. Setliff. “We think it is a real tribute to our district that our town gives us so much support.”

When the Royse City Chamber of Commerce was honored as the business recipient of the Christine Meeks award, Julia Bryant, chamber director noted that Bonnie Hannon has the distinction of having a lifetime membership for her volunteer work with the chamber. Bryant also thanked Rev. Hobbs for being a servant leader. “Its truly exciting to see the enthusiasm you’ve started inside the sanctuary and outside the sanctuary,” she said, having attended church at Meeks with other First United Methodist members.

Rev. Hobbs noted that the individual recipient of the Christine Meeks award, Mary Johnson, “has been very gracious to us.” A government teacher with a political science degree, Rev. Hobbs went on to add that it being political season, he would expect to see candidates come to Meeks Chapel, noting that people remember a handshake. “Meeks Chapel people vote, too,” he said. “What gets people elected is the people that know them,” he said.

First United Methodist Church is the organization recipient of the Earnest Epps award. Accepting it was the assistant pastor, the Rev. Cathy Partridge. “When I think of Mr. Epps, I think of roots,” she said. Epps had lived in Royse City his entire adult life, and always had a garden open to community members to enjoy. Also, she noted that the AME roots and the First Methodist Church roots are “tangled together.”

“We really appreciate the community and the common bonds and the love for Jesus Christ in this city,’ she said.

Sanders closed the evening noting that Royse City is a place he will visit again, having always passed through it on Interstate 30 on his way somewhere.